sorry," she observed, coolly. And after a moment she handed him
the bridle of her mare, saying, "You will see that she is forwarded when
your friend asks for her?"

"Yes."

She looked at the mare, then walked up slowly and put her arms around
the creature's silky neck. "Good-bye," she said, and kissed her. Turning
half defiantly on Burleson, she smiled, touching her wet lashes with her
gloved wrist.

"The Arab lady and the faithful gee-gee," she said. "I know The Witch
doesn't care, but I can't help loving her.... Are you properly
impressed with my grief?"

There was that in Burleson's eyes that sobered her; she instinctively
laid her hand on the gate, looking at him with a face which had suddenly
grown colorless and expressionless.

"Miss Elliott," he said, "will you marry me?"

The tingling silence lengthened, broken at intervals by the dull
stamping of the horses.

After a moment she moved leisurely past him, bending her head as she
entered the yard, and closing the gate slowly behind her. Then she
halted, one gloved hand resting on the closed gate, and looked at him
again.

There is an awkwardness in men that women like; there is a _gaucherie_
that women detest. She gazed silently at this man, considering him with
a serenity that stunned him speechless.

Yet all the while her brain was one vast confusion, and the tumult of
her own heart held her dumb. Even the man himself appeared as a blurred
vision; echoes of lost voices dinned in her ears--the voices of
children--of a child whom she had known when she wore muslin frocks to
her knees--a boy who might once have been this man before her--this
tall, sunburned young man, awkward, insistent, artless--oh, entirely
without art in a wooing which alternately exasperated and thrilled her.
And now his awkwardness had shattered the magic of the dream and left
her staring at reality--without warning, without the courtesy of a
"_garde a vous!_"

And his answer? He was waiting for his answer. But men are not gods to
demand!--not highwaymen to bar the way with a "Stand and deliver!" And
an answer is a precious thing--a gem of untold value. It was hers to
give, hers to withhold, hers to defend.

"You will call on us to say good-bye this evening?" she asked, steadying
her voice.

A deep color stung his face; he bowed, standing stiff and silent until
she had passed through the open door of the veranda. Then, half blind
with his misery, he mounted, wheeled, and gall